Top 15 C. C. Lamberg-Karlovsky (ed.). Archaeological thought in America. 357 pages, 35 illustrations. 1989. Cambridge & New York: Cambridge University Press; ISBN 0-521-35452-8 hardback £35 & $39.50 Quotes

Perhaps it is my lack of belief in relating the Sintashta-Petrovka with the Rig-veda, separated as they are by 1,000 years and almost as many miles, or in the alleged homogeneity of the Andronovo that Anthony finds “inaccuracies” in my article.

In fact, the extensive evidence for Bactrian Margiana materials recovered from Susa, Shahdad, Yahya, Khinaman, Sibri, Nausharo, Hissar, etc., might make it the prime candidate for Indo-Iranian arrival on the Iranian Plateau.

In their environmental settings, subsistence economies, and material cultures, the Andronovo and the Bactrian Margiana complex could not be more different. Renfrew favors an Indo-Iranian identity for the Andronovo, and he fully realizes that there is not a shred of evidence that identifies the Andronovo with the traditional homeland of the Indo-Iranian-speakers either on the Iranian Plateau or in South Asia.

Indus materials are found in Mesopotamia, but the reverse is extremely rare.

Philip Kohl’s comment is pertinent here: “Archaeological cultures should not be viewed as homogeneous or growing like plants from single seeds; they are always heterogeneous and constantly in the making.”

In the context of a renewed fashion of relating archaeology, culture, and language it is well to remember that neither sherds nor genes are destined to speak specific languages, nor does a given language require a specific ceramic type or genetic structure.

Linguists cannot associate an archaeological culture with words, syntax, and grammar, and archaeologists cannot make their sherds utter words.

Linguists too often assign languages to archaeological cultures, while archaeologists are often too quick to assign their sherds a language.

In an interesting “Afterword” to Sarianidi’s Margiana and Protozoroastrianism, J. P. Mallory asks, “How do we reconcile deriving the Indo-Iranians from two regions [the steppes and the Central Asian oases] so different with respect to environment, subsistence and cultural behavior?” (1998a:181). He offers three models, each of interest, none supported by archaeological evidence,... His conclusion is that the nucleus of Indo-Iranian linguistic developments formed in the steppes and, through some form of symbiosis in Bactria-Margiana, pushed south- ward to form the ancient languages of Iran and India. It is, however, that “form of symbiosis” that is so utterly elusive!

The fact that these language families are of far less interest to the archaeologist may have a great deal to do with the fact that it is primarily speakers of Indo-European in search of their own roots who have addressed this problem.

The identity of the Indo-Iranians remains elusive. When they are identified in the archaeological record it is by allegation rather than demonstration.

Not a single artifact of Andronovo type has been identified in Iran or in northern India, but there is ample evidence for the presence of Bactrian Margiana materials on the Iranian Plateau and in Baluchistan.

Furthermore, archaeology offers virtually no evidence for Bactrian Margiana influence on the steppe and only scant evidence for an Andronovo presence in the Bactrian Margiana area. There is certainly no evidence to support the notion that the two had a common ancestor. There is simply no compelling archaeological evidence for (or, for that matter, against) the notion that either is Indo-Iranian.

Russian scholars working in the Eurasiatic steppes are nearly unanimous in their belief that the Andronovo culture and its variant expressions are Indo-Iranian. Similarly, Russian and Central Asian scholars working on the Bactrian Margiana complex share the conviction that it is Indo-Iranian. The two cultures are contemporary but very different. Passages from the Avesta and the Rigveda are quoted by various researchers to support the Indo-Iranian identity of both, but these passages are sufficiently general as to permit the Plains Indians an Indo-Iranian identity. Ethnicity is permeable and multi-dimensional, and the “ethnic indicators” employed by Kuzmina can be used to identify the Arab, the Turk, and the Iranian, three completely distinctive ethnic and linguistic groups. Ethnicity and language are not so easily linked with an archaeological signature.

Central Asia has either too many languages and too few archaeological cultures or too few languages and too many archaeological cultures to permit an easy fit between archaeology and language.